1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a cutting apparatus for ceramic green shaped bodies which can rapidly cut a soft and deformable shaped body such as a ceramic green shaped body or the like without deformation.
2. Related Art Statement
As an example of the ceramic green shaped bodies, there is an extrusion molded body obtained by extrusion molding in the manufacturing course of ceramic honeycomb structures. This extrusion molded body is continuously extruded from an extrusion molding apparatus and cut into single parts of a given length, which are dried and fired to form ceramic honeycomb structures.
Heretofore, such a cutting of the extrusion molded body has almost been performed by manual operation of skilled workers. Because, the extrusion molded body is a soft ceramic green shaped body, and particularly the ceramic honeycomb structure is very minute in the shape and has a very thin thickness of partition wall, so that it is very difficult to flatly cut the extrusion molded body without breaking its shape and there is yet existent no proper cutting apparatus. Therefore, the cutting operation was usually carried out by the worker through an extreme fine steel wire and a jig.
In the cutting of the extrusion molded body through manual operation as mentioned above, however, the operation efficiency is low in case of mass production, and also the long time is required for mastering the technique and further there are problems in view of the yield.
Particularly, since many through-holes divided by thin partition walls extend toward the longitudinal direction of the extrusion molded body for ceramic honeycomb structures, if the breaking of the extrusion molded body is caused during the cutting, it is transmitted backward in the extrusion direction due to the dead weight of the extrusion molded body in addition to the broken portion at the cutting position, and consequently the deformation area is enlarged in the longitudinal direction.
Moreover, the extreme fine steel wire used in the cutting operation is small in the diameter (for example, 0.1-0.05 mm), so that the breaking of the wire is apt to be caused by a manner of applying force.